II. THE EDUCATIONAL PROBLEMS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA A. General Considerations Probably never in our history has there been greater recognition of the necessity of education in making available for the general welfare of the United States the talents of all Americans, including those now submerged by poverty, disadvantaged by environment, handicapped by inadequate educational backgrounds or blighted by hopelessness. We no longer accept only the advancement of knowledge made by colleges and universities through the education of leaders and professional specialists. We now recognize the potentials of institutions of higher education in the development of persons who do not enter the conventional 4-year college, and the contributions such institutions can make to the solution of the ominous threats to human dignity, order and freedom which arise from unemployment, poverty and lack of access to opportunities for self-realization. President John F. Kennedy, in his Special Message on Education in 1962, emphasized the role of education in a democracy: The concept that every American deserves the opportunity to attain the highest level of education of which he is capable . . . is a traditional ideal of democracy. For education is both the foundation and the unifying force of our democratic way of life-it is the mainspring of our economic and social progress-it is the highest expression of achievement in our society, ennobling and enriching human life. In short, it is at the same time the most profitable investment society can make and the richest reward it can confer. President Lyndon B. Johnson, in his Budget Message of January 1964, emphasized the function of education in any effective attack on poverty: We owe to every young person in America a fair start in life-and this means that we must attack those deficiencies in education, training, health, and job opportunities by which the fetters of poverty And in his 1964 Manpower Report, after pointing out that "Education must provide, as a basic part of its human development responsibility, the preparation needed for effective participation in our economic life," President Johnson stressed three needs relevant to any consideration of posthigh school education: We must provide broad opportunity for education beyond high school. We must provide increased opportunity for education at the postgraduate level. We must provide extensive programs of adult education. The Congress is significantly in accord, as is attested by its recent approval of several measures for the improvement of education and educational facilities. Indeed, the Findings and Declaration of Policy of the Higher Education Facilities Act of 1963 recites: The Congress hereby finds that the security and welfare of the United States require that this and future generations of American youth be assured ample opportunity for the fullest development of their intellectual capacities. Historically, efforts to relieve the deprivations suffered by disadvantaged segments of the population-the farm population, women and immigrant groups have depended heavily on opportunities provided for higher education. The landgrant colleges transformed rural life between 1865 and 1940. The opening of opportunities for higher education to large numbers of women through women's colleges, coeducational colleges, normal schools and teachers' colleges has been a fundamental contribution to the improved status of women. State colleges and universities, public junior colleges and urban universities have helped to bring into the mainstream of American life many national and ethnic groups. Today there is paramount need to provide full educational opportunities for the urban multitudes who are struggling under the burden of economic and cultural handicaps. Provisions for higher education must accommodate persons with the widest range of abilities, previous educational back grounds and career goals. No one with the potential ability to profit from higher education should be excluded because of inability to pay tuition or other charges or because of remediable deficiencies in prior education. Higher education for those to whom it was previously inaccessible produces consequences far beyond their own use of it. Availability makes a crucial difference in the motivation for learning at all levels and for all ages, generating hope and self-esteem among individuals and groups previously relegated to inferior status. Presenting models of successful escape from degrading conditions and providing trained leadership for those still struggling to emerge from an unfavorable background, higher education offers the best hope for community progress in our cities' battles against poverty, sickness, unemployment, and crime. The Committee has examined the reactions to this educational need in each of the 16 cities in the United States that are comparable to Washington in size (more than 250,000) and that have a substantial (more than 20 percent) nonwhite population. Almost without exception, each has recognized that the need requires the resources of strong public institutions of higher education as well as strong private colleges and universities. Five of these cities (Baltimore, Chicago, Cleveland, Miami, and St. Louis) have local public junior (or community) colleges with low tuition rates ($250 a year or less). A sixth city, Philadelphia, is in the process of organizing such an institution. Seven cities (Atlanta, Baltimore, Birmingham, Houston, Miami, New Orleans, and St. Louis) have the advantage of State-supported colleges or universities-or both-with overall costs, including room and board as well as tuition and general fees, of less than $750 a year. Six additional cities (Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dayton, Detroit, Newark, and Philadelphia) are in States where the allinclusive costs of attending State colleges or universities are above $750 but below $1,000. B. The Educational Resources and Deficiencies of the District In considering the District as one of the 10 largest cities in the United States and as the Capital of the Nation, one is inevitably struck by a number of anomalies. On the one 60-755 0-663 hand, the District has exceptional human and cultural advantages. Among its unique resources that invite study at many levels, including the very highest, are the functioning of the Congress, the courts and the White House, and the workings of the several departments and agencies of Government. It has great repositories of information, such as the National Archives, the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian Institution, and it is at the heart of an intricate process of collecting and analyzing information on problems related to all aspects of human knowledge. Other resources include the embassies and consulates of foreign nations, the offices of many national and international organizations and agencies, and a continuous stream of visitors-some to convey information, some to influence decisions, some to seek information. A fuller utilization of these resources for higher education and research would generate new knowledge and better-trained personnel for the functioning of Government and other organizations contributing to the national welfare. On the other hand, the provisions for higher education in the District compare unfavorably in several respects with those of other major cities in this country and with virtually all major European capitals. There are no general public institutions of higher education (Howard University, with its independent board of trustees, is classified as a privately controlled university); the only institution offering low-cost higher education to District citizens is D.C. Teachers College, which offers only the B.S. degree and specializes only in teacher training. Most other major American cities boast one or more public junior colleges or other public institutions of higher education. All other American cities of the size and importance of the District-and virtually every European capital-have more extensive programs of graduate, professional and post-doctoral study and research than are available in the Capital of the United States. All our major cities have provisions for the education of teachers greatly superior to those found here. And all of them also have a wider range of opportunities for post-high school education, both vocational and general. The District has an impressive array of privately controlled post-high school educational institutions. Its resources in this respect are exceeded in scope and diversity by only a few cities in the Nation. For valid reasons, however, none of the five universities in the District addresses itself primarily to District residents. None of them is in a position to extend any tuition advantages to residents of the District, and each feels itself to have a national, rather than a local mission. Howard University, while it accepts a larger number and a higher proportion of Washington residents than any of the other four District universities, continues, like its sister institutions, to feel its basic mission to be national-and more recently international. It has never followed a policy of racial discrimination (indeed, its first graduates were three white women), but it retains a strong sense of national responsibility for offering exceptional educational opportunities to members of the race in whose interest it was founded. There is impressive evidence, moreover, that the scale of tuition and fees required for attendance at the District universities makes all of them except Howard unavailable to large numbers of high school graduates, particularly from the public schools. Each of the five universities is open to students of any race, yet it is Howard, with its lower student costs, that attracts almost two-thirds of all District high school graduates who attend local universities. During the 4-year period from 1960 through 1963 it admitted 1,166 (63 percent) of the 1,837 students who entered the District universities from the District's senior public high schools. The evidence that economic factors discourage District high school graduates from seeking higher education is also apparent in a comparison of the percentage of graduates of the several District public high schools who enter college upon graduation. It is significant that this percentage varies directly with the median family income of the families in the area which the school serves. The one public high school serving an area where the median family income is above $10,000 had, during the 4-year period under study, 73.7 percent of its graduates attending college after graduation. The three schools serving areas where the median family income was between $7,000 and $10,000 were next highest (45.4, 53.0 and 45.0 percent, respectively). The three schools serving areas where the family median income was between $5,000 and $7,000 were still lower (27.0, 21.1 and 37 percent). The four schools serving areas where family incomes were below |